Rural Child Care Innovation Program Grant, (RCCIP)

Childcare is an economic driver for rural communities across our country, but many communities are facing shortages of childcare slots. The Rural Child Care Innovation Program (RCCIP) is an innovative community engagement process designed to increase the supply of high-quality affordable childcare in rural communities. The purpose of RCCIP is to guide communities in identifying the scope and size of their childcare challenges, and to empower and support communities to develop solutions to address these challenges.

The Rural Child Care Innovation Program (RCCIP) addresses the challenges of rural childcare through the lens of economic development.
The RCCIP uses a community engagement process designed to identify right-sized solutions to increase the supply of high-quality affordable childcare in rural communities.
By mobilizing community members and empowering the creation of community-based solutions, rural communities can preserve existing childcare businesses and add new childcare slots.

The Ogemaw EDC wrote for the RCCIP grant for Ogemaw County and we received the 9 month support grant to assist in gathering data to aid in efforts to find solutions for the current situation.

Here are the steps taken so far:

Organized a core team of volunteers to lead the challenge
Created a survey to begin gathering data from the following sectors: business owners, parents, childcare providers
Held a Provider Appreciation dinner to bring local providers together to recognize their efforts and to ask them what their challenges look like
Hosted a Town Hall event for the entire community with the object being to bring needed stakeholders to the table to share data, barriers and to discuss how it effects them and the entire community
Gathered all of the data and information from all of the above and met with core team members and members of the community to develop a list of do-able action steps to continue forward momtentum on our ultimate goal:

Assist the West Branch Rec Center in their efforts to establish a childcare; investigate a "pod-model" option in the area
Great Start to Quality assistance in a Mentor-Mentee support system/Provider Network, expand the current Facebook platform
Community education and advocacy, this will include a component of FSA accounts in businesses
A Community Childcare Network (include a phase 2 effort, TBD)
Address unlicensed provider issues
School district - high school co-op; Michigan Works Work Experience Program expanded in the childcare focus

Continue to meet and reevaluate the process
Create Phase 2 options where needed